Books: What I Was by Meg Rosoff
I miss books like this. It’s been so long since I’ve come across one. What I Was found me today at Chapters. I can’t even tell you where. Was it on a table (20 books to read before you’re 20? Maybe New & Hot Teen Fiction?), or maybe just there on the shelf. I have no idea now. But anyway. I picked it up and read the back and got chills up my spine. This was a book I had to read, even if it tore my guts out (which it did, mostly).
What I Was is the story of H. 16 years old and shuffled off to his 3rd boarding school in the middle of nowhere, England. Here at St. Oswald’s, H goes through the now familiar motions of his “sterling history of mediocre achievement”.
And then he meets Finn, an “almost unbearably beautiful boy” who lives by himself in a hut on the cliffs of the seaside.
What follows is the slow deepening of their regard for each other. Rosoff drags it out painfully slowly for a book that’s just over 200 pages. Like H searching Finn’s facial expressions, we are left searching the pages for any hint of how the hermit boy feels for his unasked for friend. Like all the best characters (in my humble opinion), Finn is minimal, but takes up so much space. And while it’s the mystery of Finn that kept me reading, it’s my complete and utter connection with H that made the story for me.
It takes some magical story telling for a 30 year old woman to see herself so thoroughly in the naration of a now 100 year old man remembering his 16 year old self. With every time H goes to see Finn, crossing the treacherous water, often soaking himself through with water and humiliation I could sense his feelings growing, while at the same time retaining an innocence that would not have existed if the two main characters were even two years older.
I read How I Was in about 2 hours, turning page after page with an urgency I haven’t experienced while reading in quite some time. It seemed only fitting that while reading this Young Adult novel I felt 15 again, if only briefly. Only now, instead of wolfing down my food at supper to get back to the book, I was steadfastedly ignoring the laundry in the dryer. The wrinkles would be worth it.
Nothing is perfect however, and I admit to feeling slightly cheated and annoyed at the resolution. While clever in it’s own way, it felt a bit too safe. H is metaphorically pulled out of the water one more time, no deeper self examination is needed. How convenient.
I’ll give Rosoff a bit of a break on this, though. While the ending felt too safe, I did not feel that way about the rest of the book, which is what’s important I think.
“What I Was” was a surprise, in the best way possible.